Robertsons is one of the major law firms in Hong Kong with approximately 25 Practising Solicitors, approximately 60 support staff and a Branch Office in Guangzhou, P.R.C.

The firm has capability in a wide variety of languages including English, Cantonese, Mandarin, Japanese, French, German and Spanish.

The firm also has Notaries Public and China Attesting Officer status

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The online music video revolution is here

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

We’ve all been there. Sitting in front of the computer, eagerly awaiting the playback of the latest music track. And then it happens… a pixellated, grainy video pops onto the screen, reducing your favourite artist to a mass of colourful, blurry squares.

But those days of disappointment are over, with the launch of movideo.com – Australia’s premier online destination for high quality music videos. No more pixellation, no more grainy images, just clean, high quality videos with rich audio from your favourite artists – FREE!

“It’s simple really,” says CEO of mcm entertainment, Tony McGinn. “Convergence is not coming…it’s here! The broadband pipe is now being fed into the plasma screen and surround sound system in home and office entertainment facilities. Today’s broadband internet consumers are a savvy audience and they expect the very best in their entertainment experience, particularly when its on their new wide screen TV.”

“The latest Nielsen poll shows the average amount of time people spend on the Internet has outstripped the amount of time spent watching television, with most people spending time on content driven sites, particularly in the music and entertainment arena. Therefore whatever we deliver needs to be something special and movideo.com is special and very simple.”

movideo.com offers a near DVD-quality visual experience with incredibly crisp and full range audio. There is a fast growing array of artists and genres to choose from, including Classic Rock, Blues n Roots, Brit Pop, Club, Hip-Hop, R&B, Heavy Metal and Country, all of which can be played through your quality home media centre or simply on your PC.

You can search for your favourite track by song name or artist, but what if you’re not sure what you feel like listening to? Then let the Mood and Theme playlists do the thinking for you.

“Whatever mood you’re in, whatever you want to listen to, we’ve got you covered,” says McGinn. “You’ll only hear and see the best on movideo.com and we’re growing the library of music as fast as our label partners can deliver us the high end quality video files we need to fuel movideo.com. There are over 2,500 tracks there now and we expect that to be doubled by the end of the year.”

This exciting new online music entertainment service is supplied free to the consumer by mcm on an advertiser funded basis. Users receive an equally high quality video advertisement (limited to 15 secs or less) after every third video streamed. “There are no ad breaks as such, just solus advertisements, limited in length” says mcm entertainment’s National Sales Director, Simon Joyce. “As the numbers grow, we are hopeful that our advertisers will make purpose produced ads for the experience. When the site is not in full screen mode, banner ads are also possible with the usual click through ability.”

With the cost of LCD and Plasma flat-screen TV’s dropping daily, sophisticated audio systems providing amazing sound clarity in home and ISP’s plugging in increasingly high speed internet access at increasing competitive prices, a site like movideo is set to build a loyal following of users who want quality music entertainment on tap via the internet.

But don’t just take our word for it. Log onto www.movideo.com , enlarge the player on your screen, plug in your external speakers and TURN IT UP to see and hear for yourself what all the fuss is about!

Experience a revolution in the way you watch music online – get onto movideo.com

- ENDS -

Kingsley Kelly

Poetry Discussion for Radio

Subject Poet: Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849)

And that was the latest hit single from Maroon 5. The time is now approaching 2.45. We will be bringing you the latest news headlines at the top of the hour.

Right now though it’s time for our weekly segment - Poet’s in the Spotlight.

Edgar Allan Poe had a remarkably sad and short 40 years on the planet. His mother died when he was young and as his father was an irresponsible alcoholic he went to live with an uncle who refused to adopt him possibly leading to a feeling of great resentment. After being dishonourably discharged from the military he commenced work as a journalist. He married his 13 year old cousin when he was 27 and lived pretty close to the bone. It is little wonder that his stories and poems reveal a fixation with emotional extremes particularly fear which he expresses so well in stories such as The Pit and the Pendulum.

Despite achieving critical acclaim for his writing he led a wretched life, became an alcoholic and died 2 years after his wife fell victim to tuberculosis.

For today’s programme we have selected two of Poe’s more desolate poems – “Alone” and “A Dream Within a Dream”.

Alone’ is poem exploring the meaning of solitude. It uses the words which rhyme to great effect – such is Poe’s general style. The title and the first line of “Alone” exemplify his feelings of forlornness …

“From childhood’s hour I have not been as other were”.

The poem continues to illustrate that he had a pitiful childhood and that he did not fit in with others or experience the same joys and emotions …

“My sorrow I could not awaken, my heart to joy at the same tone, and all I loved I loved alone”.

The imagery in the middle of the poem opens our imagination to the emotions of loneliness in that even the great wonders of nature such as a storm; a torrent; cliffs; and mountains or even lightning in the sky couldn’t prise him from his solitude. None of this could take away the demon within him …

“From the thunder and the storm and the cloud that took the form (where the rest of heaven was blue) of a demon in my view”.

In other words to everyone else’s eye the magnificence of nature was there to behold but his demons stood in the way of letting these wonders into his heart.

A deeper investigation into Poe’s life would make it clear that he was totally isolated insofar as expressing his feelings. It was only through his writing that he could share his emotions with the outside world. His suffering throughout his life and his inability to exorcise his demons is reflected in almost all of his writing but particularly in the poem “Alone”.

As a dream is a journey into the deep world of the inner self, a dream within a dream is even more so. In writing this Poe endeavours to illustrate the futility of life and its actions. What is life if nothing but a dream …

“You are not wrong, who deem that my days have been a dream”.

Obviously in Poe’s mind he was convinced that everyone around him believed him to live in a dream world and that the dream within a dream illustrates his thought that nothing in life matters and that holding onto it resembled clutching a handful of sand and trying to stop the grains – life – running through one’s fingers …

“And I hold within my hand, grains of the golden sand”.

It seems obvious that in his words …

“While I weep – while I weep, O God can I not save one from the pitiless wave?”

whilst realising the futility of his life and his inability to change it he was desperately pleading to hold onto at least a single grain or tenet of reality. But in conclusions he accepts that all he sees or seems to be is but a dream within a dream

Can we relate these poems to life as we know it today? Let’s analyse the socio-economic differences. People in Poe’s day didn’t quite have the same distractions we have today such as television, DVDs, I-Pods and computer games which all represent an escape from reality. What we do have today that existed in Poe’s time is alcohol and as Poe used it to escape the depressing reality of the life he lived so too do people today.

Self doubt, depression and viewing life as a futile adventure are as prevalent today as they were back then and probably more so given the untold numbers of homeless people living in depraved conditions in the back streets of our cities. Would they, if they had the ability, write about their situation in the same way Poe did. I would say so.

Poe’s lack of self esteem emanating from his perception of how he is viewed by his peers would be no different today in that by and large people tend to look down on alcoholics and desperate people. Having no where to turn they focus on the futility of their wretchedness.

It didn’t help that during Poe’s short time on the planet people of all nations were influenced by such violent events as the French Revolution, The Napoleonic Wars, The Peninsular War, Chilean Civil War, the Greek War of Independence and the greatest conflict of the time the War of 1812 - 1814. It didn’t help that during his life Americans were recovering from the War of Independence, engaged in the 1812 War which was a precursor towards the American Civil war of 1860. War in some part of the world was a always to the forefront of civilian psyche during Poe’s time which would have only added to his state of mind.

We could liken this to modern day conflicts post World War II such as the Korean and Vietnamese Wars in which many thousands of our people were involved. During the aftermath and even to the present time people are still affected in a negative way whether they were involved or not. Poe’s woes found their partial release in his writing but unfortunately the demons that occupied him were not exorcised sufficiently to allow him to live a long and peaceful life.

Well on that bright note let’s hear what you have to say. The lines are open we’ll take a caller on line one but reach for the phone now and dial 55215215.

Yes John. What does either of Poe’s poems Alone or Dream within a Dream mean to you?

John: I am more familiar with Alone and I guess that we all feel unwanted or outcast like at some time in our lives. I think that Poe put into words what we all must occasionally feel. Like you said about the Vietnam War, I am a veteran and when I returned I felt totally alone in the world and there was no one who wanted to listen to my story. If I like had the ability I might have written like Poe did.

Me: Thank you John and now let’s hear from Amelia.

Amelia: I think both poems are morbid and it’s like reading them gets you more depressed. I don’t understand why people don’t want to experience happy poetry like the romantic poets. Why do people like bad news?

Me: Thanks Amelia. You will be pleased to know that next weeks segment features one of the most romantic of poets, William Wordsworth so remember to tune in. We have time for one more called … Hi Frank …

Frank: Hi mate. I used to have a drinking problem and you are right! No one wants to know you. You are treated like dirt. I didn’t know that Poe was an alcoholic but now I can relate to it in his poetry. Actually I didn’t have much of an interest in poetry until I started listening to your segment. It’s not all soppy stuff is it?

Me: Right Frank – there’s poetry for everyone from reality to romance to the nonsense of Lewis Carrol but folks in his words … it’s Brillig – or almost and time to leave you with the news. This is me signing off until same time next week.